[Insomnia and somnolence in epilepsy].

INTRODUCTION AND

METHODS

Based on the well-known association between sleep disorders and epilepsy which share common functional elements, we investigated the existence of sleep disorders in general as seen in a series of patients who attended the electrophysiology clinic, using a simple questionnaire method dealing with sleep disorders and somnolence.

RESULTS

It was seen that there was a markedly greater prevalence of sleep disorders in epileptics as compared with non-epileptic controls. It was also observed that in partial crises these disorders are more important, mainly because of the global sleep deficit and increased nocturnal waking. Control of the crises was also important since patients with long periods free of critical episodes had fewer disorders than those with poor control.

CONCLUSIONS

The discrepancy between clinical critical control and sleep anomalies may be explained by the subclinical effect (which is usually underestimated) of inter-ictal discharges.